By submitting your email address, you understand that you will receive email communications from Bible Gateway, a division of The Zondervan Corporation, 3900 Sparks Drive SE, Grand Rapids, MI 49546 USA, including commercial communications and messages from partners of Bible Gateway. You may unsubscribe from Bible Gateway’s emails at any time. If you have any questions, please review our Privacy Policy or email us at privacy@biblegateway.com.

Israel Has Not Returned to God

4 Hear this word, you cows of Bashan on Mount Samaria,you women who oppress the poor and crush the needyand say to your husbands, “Bring us some drinks!”2 The Sovereign Lord has sworn by his holiness:“The time will surely comewhen you will be taken away with hooks,the last of you with fishhooks.[a]3 You will each go straight outthrough breaches in the wall,and you will be cast out toward Harmon,[b]”declares the Lord.4 “Go to Bethel and sin;go to Gilgal and sin yet more.Bring your sacrifices every morning,your tithes every three years.[c]5 Burn leavened bread as a thank offeringand brag about your freewill offerings—boast about them, you Israelites,for this is what you love to do,”declares the Sovereign Lord.

6 “I gave you empty stomachs in every cityand lack of bread in every town,yet you have not returned to me,”declares the Lord.

7 “I also withheld rain from youwhen the harvest was still three months away.I sent rain on one town,but withheld it from another.One field had rain;another had none and dried up.8 People staggered from town to town for waterbut did not get enough to drink,yet you have not returned to me,”declares the Lord.

9 “Many times I struck your gardens and vineyards,destroying them with blight and mildew.Locusts devoured your fig and olive trees,yet you have not returned to me,”declares the Lord.

10 “I sent plagues among youas I did to Egypt.I killed your young men with the sword,along with your captured horses.I filled your nostrils with the stench of your camps,yet you have not returned to me,”declares the Lord.

11 “I overthrew some of youas I overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah.You were like a burning stick snatched from the fire,yet you have not returned to me,”declares the Lord.

12 “Therefore this is what I will do to you, Israel,and because I will do this to you, Israel,prepare to meet your God.”

13 He who forms the mountains,who creates the wind,and who reveals his thoughts to mankind,who turns dawn to darkness,and treads on the heights of the earth—the Lord God Almighty is his name.

A Lament and Call to Repentance

5 Hear this word, Israel, this lament I take up concerning you:

2 “Fallen is Virgin Israel,never to rise again,deserted in her own land,with no one to lift her up.”

3 This is what the Sovereign Lord says to Israel:

“Your city that marches out a thousand strongwill have only a hundred left;your town that marches out a hundred strongwill have only ten left.”

4 This is what the Lord says to Israel:

“Seek me and live;5 do not seek Bethel,do not go to Gilgal,do not journey to Beersheba.For Gilgal will surely go into exile,and Bethel will be reduced to nothing.[d]”6 Seek the Lord and live,or he will sweep through the tribes of Joseph like a fire;it will devour them,and Bethel will have no one to quench it.

7 There are those who turn justice into bitternessand cast righteousness to the ground.

8 He who made the Pleiades and Orion,who turns midnight into dawnand darkens day into night,who calls for the waters of the seaand pours them out over the face of the land—the Lord is his name.9 With a blinding flash he destroys the strongholdand brings the fortified city to ruin.

10 There are those who hate the one who upholds justice in courtand detest the one who tells the truth.

11 You levy a straw tax on the poorand impose a tax on their grain.Therefore, though you have built stone mansions,you will not live in them;though you have planted lush vineyards,you will not drink their wine.12 For I know how many are your offensesand how great your sins.

There are those who oppress the innocent and take bribesand deprive the poor of justice in the courts.13 Therefore the prudent keep quiet in such times,for the times are evil.

14 Seek good, not evil,that you may live.Then the Lord God Almighty will be with you,just as you say he is.15 Hate evil, love good;maintain justice in the courts.Perhaps the Lord God Almighty will have mercyon the remnant of Joseph.

16 Therefore this is what the Lord, the Lord God Almighty, says:

“There will be wailing in all the streetsand cries of anguish in every public square.The farmers will be summoned to weepand the mourners to wail.17 There will be wailing in all the vineyards,for I will pass through your midst,”says the Lord.

The Day of the Lord

18 Woe to you who longfor the day of the Lord!Why do you long for the day of the Lord?That day will be darkness, not light.19 It will be as though a man fled from a liononly to meet a bear,as though he entered his houseand rested his hand on the wallonly to have a snake bite him.20 Will not the day of the Lord be darkness, not light—pitch-dark, without a ray of brightness?

21 “I hate, I despise your religious festivals;your assemblies are a stench to me.22 Even though you bring me burnt offerings and grain offerings,I will not accept them.Though you bring choice fellowship offerings,I will have no regard for them.23 Away with the noise of your songs!I will not listen to the music of your harps.24 But let justice roll on like a river,righteousness like a never-failing stream!

25 “Did you bring me sacrifices and offeringsforty years in the wilderness, people of Israel?26 You have lifted up the shrine of your king,the pedestal of your idols,the star of your god[e]—which you made for yourselves.27 Therefore I will send you into exile beyond Damascus,”says the Lord, whose name is God Almighty.

Woe to the Complacent

6 Woe to you who are complacent in Zion,and to you who feel secure on Mount Samaria,you notable men of the foremost nation,to whom the people of Israel come!2 Go to Kalneh and look at it;go from there to great Hamath,and then go down to Gath in Philistia.Are they better off than your two kingdoms?Is their land larger than yours?3 You put off the day of disasterand bring near a reign of terror.4 You lie on beds adorned with ivoryand lounge on your couches.You dine on choice lambsand fattened calves.5 You strum away on your harps like Davidand improvise on musical instruments.6 You drink wine by the bowlfuland use the finest lotions,but you do not grieve over the ruin of Joseph.7 Therefore you will be among the first to go into exile;your feasting and lounging will end.

The Lord Abhors the Pride of Israel

“I abhor the pride of Jacoband detest his fortresses;I will deliver up the cityand everything in it.”

9 If ten people are left in one house, they too will die.10 And if the relative who comes to carry the bodies out of the house to burn them[f] asks anyone who might be hiding there, “Is anyone else with you?” and he says, “No,” then he will go on to say, “Hush! We must not mention the name of the Lord.”

11 For the Lord has given the command,and he will smash the great house into piecesand the small house into bits.

12 Do horses run on the rocky crags?Does one plow the sea[g] with oxen?But you have turned justice into poisonand the fruit of righteousness into bitterness—13 you who rejoice in the conquest of Lo Debar[h]and say, “Did we not take Karnaim[i] by our own strength?”

14 For the Lord God Almighty declares,“I will stir up a nation against you, Israel,that will oppress you all the wayfrom Lebo Hamath to the valley of the Arabah.”

144,000 Sealed

7 After this I saw four angels standing at the four corners of the earth, holding back the four winds of the earth to prevent any wind from blowing on the land or on the sea or on any tree.2 Then I saw another angel coming up from the east, having the seal of the living God. He called out in a loud voice to the four angels who had been given power to harm the land and the sea:3 “Do not harm the land or the sea or the trees until we put a seal on the foreheads of the servants of our God.”4 Then I heard the number of those who were sealed: 144,000 from all the tribes of Israel.

5 From the tribe of Judah 12,000 were sealed,

from the tribe of Reuben 12,000,

from the tribe of Gad 12,000,

6 from the tribe of Asher 12,000,

from the tribe of Naphtali 12,000,

from the tribe of Manasseh 12,000,

7 from the tribe of Simeon 12,000,

from the tribe of Levi 12,000,

from the tribe of Issachar 12,000,

8 from the tribe of Zebulun 12,000,

from the tribe of Joseph 12,000,

from the tribe of Benjamin 12,000.

The Great Multitude in White Robes

9 After this I looked, and there before me was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne and before the Lamb. They were wearing white robes and were holding palm branches in their hands.10 And they cried out in a loud voice:

“Salvation belongs to our God,who sits on the throne,and to the Lamb.”

11 All the angels were standing around the throne and around the elders and the four living creatures. They fell down on their faces before the throne and worshiped God,12 saying:

“Amen!Praise and gloryand wisdom and thanks and honorand power and strengthbe to our God for ever and ever.Amen!”

13 Then one of the elders asked me, “These in white robes—who are they, and where did they come from?”

14 I answered, “Sir, you know.”

And he said, “These are they who have come out of the great tribulation; they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.15 Therefore,

“they are before the throne of Godand serve him day and night in his temple;and he who sits on the thronewill shelter them with his presence.16 ‘Never again will they hunger;never again will they thirst.The sun will not beat down on them,’[a]nor any scorching heat.17 For the Lamb at the center of the thronewill be their shepherd;‘he will lead them to springs of living water.’[b]‘And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.’[c]”